Planet Earth, Ming Dynasty year 1560
Tarkin sat in Suzu's bed holding his screaming newborn daughter gently in his arms.
The first thing he did was closely examine the backs of both her hands, as he expected her right hand was flawless, all five fingers and no silver marking.
He felt a pang of dissapointment that he swiftly quashed.
He hadn't really expected her to have spatial magic but couldn't stop himself from harboring a slight hope.
When he switched to her left hand he let out a gasp, there was a very faint silver symbol, his daughter had a passive magic.
He had no clue what it could be of course, there were thousands of passive marks and he was no scholar.
But just the fact that his daughter would have an advantage in this harsh world made him swell with happiness.
Suzu leaned up wearily and put her arms around him from behind, resting her chin on his shoulder.
She spoke softly. "She's beautiful Tar kin. What should we name her?"
Tarkin didn't have to think about it for a second, he already knew. "Rina." He said with tears of joy in his eyes.
"After your sister?" Suzu asked him. "It's a beautiful name. Tell me more about her."
He handed his crying daughter off to Suzu and recounted tales of the person he missed the most.
He told her of some of the mischief they had gotten up to in the streets of Ranock, snatching treats from stalls even though they had the money to pay for them just to enjoy the chase they always had the advantage in, shifting short distances away whenever they were almost caught.
He shared with her his happiest memories of Rina, and also the sad ones.
As he spoke the grief he had been holding onto for the past four years faded into the background.
He would never be free from the guilt and pain of causing the deaths of so many loved ones, but the joy he felt in the presence of his newborn daughter was undeniable.
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Planet Selara, year 2020 on earth
Cal wasn't sure what made him continue on the journey he had started with Lilly.
He could have turned back to Crossroads or gone anywhere else, but when he woke up in Vera's camp the next morning he had set off north again immediately.
Vera and Mia followed him with Vera claiming she couldn't let their source of food go off on his own.
Cal heard tales of the abilities of a spatial mage from some of the other slaves during his captivity, and now that he was uncollared he had been trying to figure them out.
He could feel an energy in his right hand if he focused on his symbol, and it would start glowing silver.
He looked at a spot further up the road and willed himself to be there, but like all his previous attempts nothing happened.
He let out a frustrated sigh and walked off the road to take a break, sitting down on a shaded rock and pulling off his pack to get some water.
Vera sat next to him and they watched Mia as she collected rocks to stack, balancing them on each other as high as she could.
"Still no luck with your magic?" Vera asked.
"No, I don't know what I'm doing wrong." Cal replied, frustrated. "I can feel the energy in my hand and my mark glows, but nothing happens."
Vera contemplated for a moment. "The energy is only in your hand? Wouldn't it make sense if you wanted to move your whole body that the energy should affect all of you?" She asked.
Cal called the energy back to his hand and focused on it, trying to draw it down his arm to the rest of his body.
He felt the tingle of energy race down his body and grew excited, his mark was brighter than ever before.
Cal looked at a spot on the road in front of him and willed himself to be there, staring intently at the ground.
Suddenly there was no rock beneath him, and he fell onto his ass.
He let out a whoop of joy and mentally filed away not to teleport while sitting again.
A breeze blew across the road and Cal realised he shouldn't be feeling it on his junk, looking down to find himself completely nude.
Vera laughed and walked over holding out his robe. "Maybe next time spread the energy to your clothes too, yeah?" She teased.
Cal snatched his robe from her hands and hastily pulled it over his head, cheeks blushing furiously.
His shame did not diminish his joy and the second he was clothed he tried again, mentally pulling the energy onto his robe this time and focusing on the rock his pack was sitting on.
He appeared fully clothed standing on the rock next to his pack and grinned broadly.
"I can teleport!" He shouted in joy.
Mia laughed and ran up to him. "Teleport me, teleport me!" She screamed.
"Don't even think about it!" Vera yelled while Cal was reaching out to lift Mia into his arms.
Cal pulled his arms back and put on an exagerated fake pout. "Sorry kiddo mommy says no." He told Mia sadly.
"Do not make me the bad guy here Cal, would you risk her safety doing something you have only performed sucessfully once?" Vera snapped.
Cal knew she was right, but Vera was fun to mess with. "Fine let me test it on you first." He said, expecting her to react angrily.
To his astonishment Vera held out her hand and replied. "Alright but if you teleport me without my clothes I will make you regret it."
Cal's fake pout turned into a wide grin and he grabbed Vera by the hand, willing his energy to encompass them both entirely.
He took longer than what he felt was necessary to ensure he had all her clothing covered before looking at the road further away than he had tried previously and willing himself to be there.
Cal and Vera appeared on the road in the spot he had been picturing and Cal felt like he had just run a marathon while carrying a fridge, he would have fallen over if not for Vera holding him up.
Vera helped him back over to the rock and he sat down heavily, but the exhaustion was lessening by the second and just a couple minutes later he felt as good as new.
"Guess I can't just teleport continuously." He said. "Or maybe carrying a passenger makes it harder."
"My turn, my turn!" Mia shrieked, climbing up onto the rock and latching onto Cal's back while he sat.
Cal stood up and Mia wrapped her legs around his stomach, her arms around his neck squeezing a little too hard.
He ran around with her on his back causing her to erupt in giggles, and he even saw one of Vera's rare smiles.
"Well Vera, what do you think, am I ready to teleport Mia?" Cal asked.
"Please mom!" Mia pleaded.
"Fine, just be careful." Vera said. "If you..." She began but stopped speaking and sighed when they both vanished, reappearing on the road.
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Sophia didn't seek out the combat healer when she arrived at Ranock, she headed straight to the library.
The guards at the city gate had let her in without asking any questions, and she got directions to the library from the first person she asked.
She arrived at the massive white stone building the size of San Fran's city hall, tied her mule's reigns to a nearby fence post, and sprinted up the stairs.
When she opened one side of the massive glass and metal double doors and stepped inside, her mouth fell open in astonishment.
The building was a massive hollow oval, the ceiling soaring six floors up.
Each floor was a walkway running around the walls with bookshelves floor to ceiling and the occasional fancy mahogany table and chairs.
The ground floor had bookshelves covering the entire middle, reaching almost to the railing of the first floor.
As the door shut behind Sophia a mousy looking middle aged woman wearing a modest grey dress with matching eyes and frizzy unkempt brown hair pulled into a loose braid behind her looked up.
"Out! Get out!" She shouted, and Sophia was stunned.
"W-what?" She stammered. "I was told this is a public library."
"It is a public library, but I can smell you from here, you're tracking in mud, and your clothes are filthy and torn!" She said, not at all in the quiet voice one should use in a library.
"You are welcome to come back when you don't look like an orcish bride." She said sternly, and Sophia left the building shamefully.
As she walked down the steps she sniffed at her armpit and recoiled, she truly did smell atrocious.
She untied her mule and led it off to find an inn.
Sophia asked around for a decent inn and found herself outside of a nice looking building with flowers planted under the windows, she tied up her mule and went in to secure a room.
The common room was packed but everyone gave her a wide berth, her cheeks reddening in shame when she thought about how bad she smelled.
She went to the counter and paid for a room and someone to stable and feed her mule before asking about a bath and a market she could purchase some clothes at.
The man informed her the inn didn't have baths but gave her directions to a bathhouse and a market.
After storing her pack and the bags from her mule in her room Sophia headed off to get clean.
She purchased two pairs of stiff brown pants from a vendor who insisted they were for men, and two different cloth shirts that looked comfortable.
Next she picked up a new pair of nice leather fingerless gloves, her cheap fluffy ones from Earth were riddled with holes after her journey.
She made her way to the bathhouse with her new purchases held out far in front of her, trying to avoid getting them filthy.
Sophia paid the woman sitting at a counter outside the bathhouse and headed inside not sure what to expect.
The large stone building was a rectangle with four massive pools of steaming water.
There were stone benches and shelves placed along the walls, and pathways ran in a cross from wall to wall seperating the pools.
There were no private rooms.
Sophia set her clothes on a bench next to the pool with the least people in it and stuffed her new clothes into a cubby before starting to strip.
She got out of her clothes quickly and snatched a bar of soap from the shelf, hurrying to submerge her body in the water and out of sight.
Sophia tried to keep her eyes off the other patrons while she hastily scrubbed at herself, but she had been alone for months and there were so many naked women around her.
She couldn't stop her eyes from wandering, checking out a few of the women sharing the pool with her.
Her cheeks were flushed and she knew it wasn't just from the steaming heat of the water.
Her eyes were glued to a set of perfect breasts when she realised she had stopped scrubbing, looking away quickly and resuming cleaning herself more vigorously than before.
Sophia finished her bath and was about to get out but couldn't resist one more glance at the well endowed woman she had been ogling.
She turned to look and to her horror the woman was wading across the pool straight over to her.
"Hello, I'm Kyla, you were looking at me." She said teasingly.
Sophia grew even redder, trying to cover her breasts with her hands.
"Um hi, I'm Sophia. I have to go." She said, and scrambled to get out of the bath.
Kyla laughed. "Ok Sophia, nice to meet you." She said as Sophia ran to her bench.
Sophia toweled herself off quickly and pulled on her clothes before rushing out of the bathhouse in embarassment.
As shea walked back to her inn she guiltily though about her fiance from Earth, wondering how long she would wait for her.
Sophia's heart ached, she missed her so badly, but she was lonely and knew she could never go home.
She promised herself she would try to move on.
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Cal woke up to Vera's hand coving his mouth, she leaned forward until her lips were right next to his ear.
"Be quiet and get up, we have company." She said softly.
Mia was standing next to her, rubbing sleepily at her eyes but staying quiet.
Cal got up and quickly rolled up his bedroll, strapping it to the outside of his pack as quietly as possible.
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"Which way do we go?" He asked in a whisper.
Vera turned in a circle, sniffing at the air. "We are surrounded. Can you teleport all three of us?" She asked quietly.
Cal had been practicing his teleportation for the last two weeks of their journey, Mia being a helpful and willing test subject.
"I don't think so." He replied, thinking back to the last time he had tried to spread his aura over all three of them.
"Take Mia and go." She said. "Come back for me when she is safe."
Cal nodded and stooped to wrap Mia in his arms. As he bent down he felt the air rush past his head, an arrow passing a centimeter over him.
He scooped Mia up and frantically tried to picture a location in his mind, a second later he was in the clearing they had stopped at to take a break the day before.
He set Mia down quickly and pictured where he had just been, popping into existence right next to Vera and grabbing her arm.
They dissapeared right as anither arrow flew through the space Vera had just been standing in, reappearing next to Mia who ran over to hug her mom.
Cal spotted an arrow sticking out of Vera's shoulder and became consumed with a white-hot rage, dropping his pack to the ground and searching through it frantically.
"It's ok Cal." Vera said. "Calm down, vampires heal quickly."
He ignored her, finding what he was looking for in his pack. He pulled out the long steel hunting knife Lilly had purchased for their trip, dissapearing again before Vera could stop him.
He was done being pushed around by the evil people of this world, he had had enough.
He appeared in their campsite, spotting a man rummaging through the pack Vera had been carrying since rescuing him from Lilly.
Cal didn't give him time to react, the second he saw the man he teleported right behind him, driving his knife into the mans spine as he tried to stand.
Cal kept his spatial energy wrapped around the knife, and as soon as he saw the next man he teleported again not bothering to pull the blade back out.
This man was carrying a bow and had pulled back and released an arrow the second Cal stabbed his companion.
Cal appeared at his side, plunging his blade into the man's neck before looking frantically around for more targets.
He spotted two more men running away from him on the other side of the camp and grinned, looking ahead of one of them before turning around and holding his blade straight out at stomach height and vanishing once again.
The man ran directly into his blade, his mouth opening in shock as his hands shot to the fresh wound in his stomach.
Cal pulled his arm back letting the man fall to the ground and looked for the last bandit, he could hear him crashing away through the dark forest but couldn't spot him so he let him go.
Cal was too exhausted to teleport after him anyways, he would have to wait a few minutes before he could even make it back to Vera and Mia.
He knelt next to the man he had just gutted who was now moaning in pain on the ground.
He was a young man around Cal's own age and Cal realised he would be eighteen by now back on Earth.
"Please..." The man began, but Cal didn't give him a chance to make him second guess himself, he knew he would end up letting him live if he hesitated.
He dragged his sharp knife across the man's throat cutting off his protests before patting the man's body down, finding a few copper coins and a crude dull dagger.
He pocketed the coins and left the blade before walking back to the other two men he had killed.
The one he had stabbed in the spine was still breathing as well but he couldn't even speak, blood burbling at his lips.
Cal finished him off and repacked the bag he had been sorting though.
This man had a shortsword on a leather sword belt at his waist and Cal pulled it off, fastening it on himself and adjusting it until it felt right.
He moved to the last body and searched it, he had nothing but a quiver of arrows and a bow.
Cal left those there, if Vera wanted them she could take them tomorrow when he teleported them back.
He vanished for a final time, appearing next to a furious looking Vera.
"What do you think you are doing!" She demanded angrily. "Why did you leave me here with an arrow in my back? You think Mia is going to pull it out?"
Cal scratched the back of his head, "Uh sorry, I was just really angry. I'm done getting pushed around." He said.
Vera noticed the sword strapped to his waist and the blood soaking his hands. "Did you get them all?" She asked.
"One got away." He said. "But I got three."
She glared at him. "You idiot, if he tells people a spatial mage killed his friends and people believe him we will have an army after us."
"They already saw me teleport all three of us away, and one man is less likely to be believed than four." He said, his anger rising to match hers. "Do you want me to remove that arrow or not."
Vera continued glaring at him for a moment, her arms crossed over her chest. "Yes." She said. "And I will need to feed to heal the wound."
She sat on the log that had been the reason they stopped there the day before and Cal moved behind her.
Mia was already sitting on the log and she grabbed her mother's hand in her own.
"Are you ready?" Cal asked, gripping the arrow.
Vera gritted her teeth. "Do it."
Cal yanked the arrow out and Vera didn't even flinch.
He moved to her side and held his arm in front of her face to let her feed, she bit into his arm and took a few long pulls before pushing it away.
"Cal please think next time before you go off on your own trying to be a hero." Vera said softly. "What would Mia and I do if you got yourself killed? We are weeks away from any towns."
"And Mia would miss you, and I would miss you too." She said even quieter.
"I'm sorry Vera." Cal said. "You're right, I wasn't thinking. It won't happen again."
Vera smiled slightly as Cal admitted his fault, and Cal realised he shouldn't be able to see her expression.
"Why is it so light out here?" He said, looking around.
"What are you talking about?" Vera asked.
"I mean I can see your face, I can see everything. It's practically daylight. Is it just me?"
Vera frowned, "What's your passive magic?" She asked.
"Passive magic...?" Cal said.
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Sophia spent three days in the library. The librarian, Gladys, thankfully made no further mention of Sophia's earlier appearance.
Gladys had an extremely helpful passive magic mark that allowed her to perfectly recall information she had read, and fetched Sophia dozens of books about combat healers without questioning why she was interested in them.
Sophia hadn't found much concrete information, there was a lot of speculation and conflicting reports of their abilities.
She did learn a lot more about the world she was in however. She learned it was called Selara, and she was on the continent of Durren. The city of Ranock was the largest human city on Durren.
She had learned all she could at the library and knew it was time to go find the man Mauve had told her about.
She had been leaving the library each day when it closed at sundown, so Gladys was surprised when she left in the middle of the day.
Sophia returned to her inn to eat some lunch instead of grabbing some street food like she had the last few days.
She went up to the bar and asked for a meal and a mug of watered down ale, the ale here was ridiculously strong she had discovered, and picked out a table to wait.
She was lost in thought about her upcoming confrontation with the combat healer when a plate of food and a mug were set down on her table and she looked up to thank the serving girl.
It was Kyla, Sophia recognized her short pixie cut blonde hair and bright blue eyes, a big grin on her face.
She was wearing a revealing dark blue dress with a plunging neckline that seemed designed to show off her breasts.
"Hello Sophia, my eyes are up here." She said teasingly.
"Sorry." Sophia said, her cheeks heating once again as she averted her eyes.
"I'm glad I ran into you again, are you staying here?" Kyla asked.
"Yes, I've been here for a few days." Sophia replied, carefully keeping her gaze above Kyla's neck.
"How long are you going to be staying here?" Kyla asked.
"I don't know, probably for a long time though." Sophia replied.
"Well I better get back to work, care to get some drinks with me here later tonight?" Kyla asked.
Sophia thought about her fiance. "No I don't think that would be a good idea." She said.
"Come on, you owe me for peeping on me in the bath." Kyla said teasingly.
Sophia smiled and reminded herself of her promise to try to move on. Allie wouldn't want me to be alone, she probably already has someone new herself. She told herself.
"Ok, just one or two, I'm not a big drinker." She said.
"Excellent, it's a date!" Kyla said as she stalked off back to the kitchen.
When Sophia finished her meal she brought her mug and plate to the bar and asked the bartender for some information.
"Do you know anything about a combat healer working for the royal family?" She asked.
"I may remember hearin somethin bout the man." The bartender said, holding his palm out to her.
Sophia sighed and placed two coppers in his hand.
He glanced down at his palm and scowled. "Two coppers, really?" He said and Sophia sighed again, adding three more.
"Thas more like it." He said while pocketing the coins.
"His name's Blackburn if'n I recall correctly, he's one o' the princess's bodyguards. Don know much else bout him 'cept that he can kill ya jus by layin a finger on yer skin."
"Where can I find him?" Sophia asked.
"Don know why ye'd be wantin' te talk with a man like that. But if yer set on it yer best bet be the keep."
"And where is the keep?" Sophia asked, annoyed he hadn't volunteered the information.
"Take a right out the door and keep goin, ye'l know it when ye see it, can't miss it." He said.
Sophia thanked him and left.
She spotted the walls of the keep in the distance after a short walk, it was a massive square stone building surrounded by high walls patrolled by guards.
Four watchtowers rose at the corners of the walls and the entire thing was encircled by a wide moat.
The drawbridge was big enough to drive three carts across it side by side, and it was currently lowered and crawling with people streaming in and out.
She crossed the bridge and had to wait in a short line behind a number of people all dressed in much fancier clothing than her.
The guard interrogating people in her line before letting them in gave her a questioning look when it was her turn.
"Name and nature of your buisness." He demanded.
"Sophia Reed, I'm here to talk to a man named Blackburn." She replied honestly.
"Blackburn isn't here. He's wherever the princess is." The guard said.
"Do you know where they might be?" Sophia asked.
"She's off getting pissed at one of her favourite bars. Try The Ditzy Dryad or The Wobbly Stool." The guard grinned.
Sophia was holding up the line and didn't want to waste any more of the guard's time so she thanked him and left to ask someone else directions to the places he had mentioned.
She arrived at The Ditzy Dryad in just a few minutes of walking and she could hear the loud drunken revelry from the street.
When she was still a short ways from the door it slammed open and an incredibly drunk man flew out, landing on his ass.
She walked around him and entered the pub, the noise was deafening and instantly gave her a pounding headache thanks to her heightened senses.
A three piece band was playing a fast paced tune with flutes and some sort of stringed instrument, and the floor in front of the stage was crowded with people spinning each other around in circles.
She pushed her way through the crowd and sat at an empty stool at the bar, waiting for a bartender to come talk to her while she rubbed at her temples.
One of the bartenders finally made his way over to her and she shouted to be heard. "Is the princess here tonight?"
"No need to shout lass. No she's not in tonight." The man's voice sounded directly into her head.
"Ok thank you. Could you point me in the direction of The Wobbly Stool please?" She asked at a normal volume, unable to hear her own voice over the sounds of the room.
The man heard her regardless and spoke directly into her mind again giving her detailed directions, and she made her way out the door in a hurry, eager to escape the noise.
Sophia found herself in front of The Wobbly Stool and read the sign twice certain that she was in the wrong place, it was nothing like The Ditzy Dryad.
She expected an establishment with such a name to be a rundown wreck of a building like the last bar, but that couldn't be further from the truth.
The Broken Stool was a pleasant stone building with a well dressed doorman who opened the door for her as she approached.
There were only a handful of people in the spacious room, and a beautiful woman in an expensive looking flowing white dress was expertly playing a massive golden harp in the corner.
Sophia spotted a young blonde woman that matched the princess's description sitting at a tiny square table across from a broad shouldered rough looking woman with a buzz cut and an eyepatch over her left eye.
An intimidating looking man wearing all black leather and a hood covering his head was standing a few feet behind the princess alertly looking around the room.
As Sophia made her way over to the table the princess took a shot and slammed the glass down.
"Eight." She slurred.
The grizzled woman downed her shot and grimaced, before picking up the half full bottle in the center of the table and pouring them each another shot.
The man had spotted her the second she headed in their direction, eyeing her approach.
"Are you Blackburn?" Sophia asked him, stopping a few feet away.
"Who's asking." The man replied, his arms crossed over his chest.
Sophia took the glove off her right hand and held it out to show him her mark.
"My name is Sophia Reed, I heard you are a combat healer and was hoping you could teach me how to use my magic." She said.
The man looked at her hand and then up into her eyes.
"Nine." The princess said, her glass slamming onto the table again while Blackburn held Sophia's gaze.
"Put your glove back on." He finally said. "We can talk after I carry the princess home. Shouldn't be too much longer now, have a seat."
Sophia moved to sit at one of the two open chairs next to the princess but Blackburn stopped her.
"Not here, I can't let you near the princess with that mark of yours."
Sophia walked over to the bar and ordered an ale, watching the drinking contest continue.
"Elvelvenen." The princess said, and Sophia snorted.
The Grizzled woman didn't hesitate and knocked back her shot, pouring two more.
"I'll beat you some day Hellen." The princess slurred while trying unsuccessfully to stand up.
"No you won't." Hellen replied not even sounding drunk, and finished off both of the shots she had just poured since it was obvious the princess was done.
Blackburn picked the unsteady princess up in his arms and looked to Sophia, jerking his head towards the door. Hellen and Sophia both stood up and followed him out.
Blackburn looked at her as she walked up to his side. "Not too close." He said, and Sophia fell back a ways.
She nervously tried to make small talk with Hellen. "So Hellen is it? Are you one of the princess's bodyguards too?" She asked.
Helen grunted and spit to the side. "Yes." She said. "It's a fun job."
"Seems like it." Sophia said. "Do you mind if I ask what your active magic is?"
"Don't have any." Hellen responded. "But my passive magic is strength, I could rip you in half."
Sophia's face paled and Hellen rushed to add "Not that I'd do something like that, don't worry."
Blackburn laughed, the princess snoring and drooling in his arms.
They walked in silence, except for the princess's snoring, the rest of the way back to the keep.
Sophia followed them across the drawbridge and past the guard who she had spoken with earlier, who nodded at her, and into the courtyard of the keep.
"Wait here." Blackburn said to her, and continued up the steps into the keep with the princess and Hellen.
Sophia sat on a stone bench and waited, watching the various well dressed passersby.
A short time later Blackburn emerged from the keep by himself leaving Hellen and the princess inside, and sat next to her on the bench.
"I can't teach you." He began, and Sophia's hopes fell. "Unless you are prepared to swear into the king's service."
"What does that entail?" Sophia asked. "How long are we talking?"
"Life long." He replied. "The pay is excellent though, I assure you. You would likely be assigned as a guard for one of the more important members of the court, maybe even the princess eventually but not being a native of Ranock I doubt it."
"Exactly how 'excellent' is the pay?" She asked.
"You would start at one gold per day." He replied. "Royal guards are each provided with a room in the keep and three meals a day, the rooms are nice and the food is the same the nobles eat."
Sophia was dissaointed, as a healer Mauve charged five silvers a customer, she could make more just healing people.
Blackburn guessed what she was thinking. "You could still sell your healing services, royal guards only work in twelve hour shifts."
Sophia felt he was upselling her for some reason, there had to be a catch.
"The worst part of the job is not being able to take a day off." He told her.
And there it is. She thought.
"You would work seven days a week, every week. I'm making ten gold a day now, in case you're wondering."He said.
Sophia thought about it for a minute, she didn't know if she would be able to learn how to heal on her own and being able to use the offensive part of her magic might save her life someday.
"When can we start?" She asked.
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King Lucious Ranock sat on his throne as a pretty young brunette wearing men's clothing knelt in front of him and pledged her fealty.
Not long ago he would have visited her in the night and taken her like he had been doing to all his prettiest servants and guards ever since he had disposed of his wife, but he had made promises he intended to keep.
That didn't stop him from fantasizing though, and as the woman delivered the long oath of fealty on her knees before him he ran the scene through his mind.
She would protest and she would cry, he would like that. But the oath would not be ignored, the magic in his crown would force her to bend to his will.
He was busy picturing her face turning red as he choked her while pounding her roughly beneath him when she finally finished the oath and it came his turn to respond.
He snapped out of his daydream and spoke the lines he had spoken many times before, accepting her pledge and making one of his own.
He wouldn't be held to it of course, but theatre had it's place in politics.
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Sophia sat in The Ditzy Dryad and sighed, she hated this job.
At least she had another date with Kyla to look forward to tonight. She thought back to their date she had been late to after meeting with Blackburn.
Kyla was very forward, she tried very hard to get Sophia to invite her up to her room on their first date but had settled for making out in the common room of the inn when Sophia wouldn't give in.
It had only taken her one more date to get her to cave and now they were seeing each other almost every night.
The day after her first date with Kyla Blackburn had taken her to a man that had a passive magic of detecting falsehoods and questioned her for hours.
When he was finally satisfied that she wasn't a spy or an assassin he had brought her to the king, a normal looking man in his fourties with sandy blonde hair in a crew cut and a well maintained Van Dyke beard.
His only notable feature was his piercing blue eyes and Sophia could see his resemblance to the princess.
Blackburn had her practice an oath of fealty before her audience with the king and she had delivered it flawlessly.
After that he had 'trained' her and she had felt cheated, she was sure that she could have figured out her powers on her own.
It was incredibly intuitive, he told her how to differentiate the energies she felt when she focused on her mark.
One of them felt pure and full of life, that one she could use to heal people just by pushing the energy out of her mark and into someone.
The other felt chilly and made goosebumps pop out on her arm when she drew on it. She hadn't yet had a reason to test it out but Blackburn assured her it would instantly stop someone's heart.
To both her and Blackburn's surprise the king had come to find them and switched Blackburn over into his service, assigning Sophia to his old post.
And so there she sat watching a drunk princess try to fight with a terrified looking woman who had somehow offended her and was now trying to get away before her guards intervened.
Sophia was sure Hellen would handle this one with her strength, Sophia wasn't here to restrain Princess Alexandra, she was here to guard her with deadly magic.
After the way she had first met the princess Sophia assumed she was a party girl who went and got drunk every night.
But Sophia learned the princess didn't drink often, she just went hard whenever she did. In fact this was the first time she had seen the princess get drunk again since being assigned to her.
Princess Alexandra spent most of her days training her terrifying magic, the bloodline magic of the Ranock's, warping shadows to slice apart targets and projectiles.
Sophia had seen her rip apart an entire stone wall in a fit of rage when her twelve year old brother Prince Derrin pulled a prank on her.
I sold my freedom for a steady paycheck. Sophia mused wryly, but she was ok with it.
Her new life wasn't very bad all things considered.
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